


a sense of something new

by paperpenpal



Series: Read the Syllabus [2]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: ?? i guess it's fluff?, Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Teachers, Day 6: AU, F/M, Fluff, Gen, Humor, No Beta, Pool Noodles, Silly, Sylvgrid Week (Fire Emblem), This Is The Silliest Thing I Have Ever Written, how do I even tag this, it's literally a joke don't take it too seriously
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-06
Updated: 2020-06-06
Packaged: 2021-03-04 06:27:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24579022
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paperpenpal/pseuds/paperpenpal
Summary: Ingrid's just trying to have a nice lunch in the teacher's lounge but things are never quiet at the Academy, not with these guys.AKA:The Modern Day American Teacher AU no one asked for but I wrote anyway.
Relationships: Ingrid Brandl Galatea/Sylvain Jose Gautier
Series: Read the Syllabus [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1778224
Comments: 21
Kudos: 65
Collections: Sylvgrid week 2020, The Pool Noodle Collective





	a sense of something new

**Author's Note:**

> I am _not_ an AU writer, at least not to this degree. My AUs tend to be closely aligned to canon with one change but this is a whole new setting here but it's Sylvgrid week and I wanted to try something new!
> 
> The only problem is that I had no idea what to do. At first, I tried to think of all the series I liked but none of them really fit so I looked at my life. I might not know much about the world but I am a teacher so...write what you know right?
> 
> And, for all you non-Americans out there, a freshman is a first year high school student.

_The teacher’s lounge is as lively as ever_ , Ingrid thinks as she slips in twenty minutes after the first lunch bell had rung. She had been caught up in her classroom with a very high achieving freshman asking her all sorts of questions about Model UN who reminds her way too much of herself.

Sometimes, she’s not really sure how she got here, working at a very well off suburban prep school when she herself had come from a relatively modest background. Everything she’s ever done was fueled by scholarships and hard work, half of her students are fueled by money, privilege, and pettiness.

But they’re just kids. She can’t blame them for that. She just hopes that she can teach them a little something about the world.

The lounge is full today. It probably has to do with the administration’s refusal to turn on the AC before a certain date, regardless of the actual temperature. It’s saving cost, they keep saying, but it’s a bizarre excuse given the fact that this school is comparatively well funded and that all her students and all the teachers are miserable in the heat and longing for a summer break still two months away.

Ingrid always has lunch in here. Some of the teachers take it in their classrooms but this is the only place and time for everyone to mingle at work and talk about something other than it. There’s prep periods sure, but they are spread out differently throughout their days and since Ingrid’s social life is, somewhat sadly, all wrapped up in this school and in this work, it is one of the most valuable times of her day.

She doesn’t mind it. She doesn’t mind her lack of a social life. She likes her coworkers and they spend a lot of time after school gossiping about the students, usually over a glass of wine and a board game that no one knows how to play.

She retrieves her lunch from the fridge, pops her Tupperware in the microwave, leaning against the counter to watch as Dorothea rounds on Felix in the corner.

“What’s that about?” she asks the room.

“Oh that?” Annette says, next to her, having used the microwave before her. “Something about Dorothea borrowing gym equipment.”

Ingrid frowns. “Why does a drama teacher need gym equipment?”

But before Annette can try to explain, Dorothea has already stomped over, dramatically muscling her way in between the two girls to lean her backside on the counter. Had she been a student, Ingrid would have scolded her. “He’s the _worst._ ” Dorothea huffs, arms crossed, not unlike Felix had looked only a moment before. “What does the swim team need pool noodles for? They already know how to swim!”

Ingrid can’t hide her grin. “I think it’s for lessons Dorothea. He’s also the health and fitness teacher, remember?”

“You wouldn’t know it.” She huffs again, overly dramatic on purpose, as she twirls a long strand of hair. “He works those kids to death.”

“You’re one to talk.” Ingrid nudges Dorothea as the microwave beeps, then she hurries to take out her lunch so that Ashe can use it.

Annette pipes up then. “He’s not so bad,” she says, glancing over at where Felix now sits glaring in their direction while Dimitri tries valiantly to redirect his attention.

“Oh?” Dorothea says, eyebrow raised at Annette.

Annette flushes a pretty pink, looking wide-eyed at Ingrid, “That’s not-!” she starts.

Feeling bad, Ingrid directs the girls to an empty table and saves Annette from anything she doesn’t want to say. She has gotten good at redirecting Dorothea, she had to learn how the hard way. Poor Annette probably wouldn’t stand a chance. The music teacher is sweet and Dorothea can be quite a lot to handle sometimes. Then again…Ingrid has seen Annette drill into a student twice her size for fighting in the hallway and _that_ had been terrifyingly awesome, so maybe she’d be fine.

The performing arts were a scary discipline. It’s why she sticks with literature, well, literature and politics- strange combination she knows.

But she saves the redhead anyway. “What do _you_ need pool noodles for Thea?”

“Props!” Dorothea answers. “Obviously.”

“Right…” Ingrid trails with an amused grin.

Annette chimes in, a puzzled expression on her face, “why can’t you just share them?”

“That’s what I’m saying!” Dorothea throws her hands up. “He can spare fifty pool noodles for one afternoon.”

At the same time that Annette goes “ _Fifty?_ ” Ingrid shrugs and says, “He gets really protective over his equipment.”

Dorothea smirks. “Know something about that?”

It takes her a second to catch the joke. “Dorothea!” Ingrid practically screeches. She is sure her face is as red as Annette’s hair. “We are teachers in a high school! Not appropriate!”

It is this moment that Sylvain, of all people, sits down, with a lunch tray, uninvited at the table. “What’s not appropriate?”

Ingrid groans. She wants to disappear into her chair.

“We’re talking about Felix’s equipment,” Dorothea says casually, swiping one of Sylvain’s chips. “And calm down, there aren't any students around.”

Ingrid throws helpless eyes at Annette who throws them right back and now with Sylvain here…

“Oh, you would know all about that wouldn’t you?” He smirks.

Dorothea throws a chip at him before Ingrid can. “Please,” she says with a wave. “We’d kill each other.”

Sylvain considers this for a moment, chewing over the thought. “I don’t know. I think that’s kind of the point,” he says. “It might be cathartic. Half the school ships you two together. The other half is rooting for Annette.”

Ingrid furrows her brow at the same time Annette buries her hands into her face. “Ships?” Ingrid asks. “What’s that mean?”

“Ingrid, dear, the internet is a great place, you should try it sometime.” Dorothea laughs.

Annette shakes her head, “I hate this,” she bemoans, but she doesn’t leave.

This is one of the reasons Ingrid likes it here. The work is hard, sometimes the students can be annoying, but the atmosphere is good and she’s never really had anything like it. She has spent most of her life studying too hard to pay much attention to her social environment and make any lasting bonds. Here, her coworkers feel more like friends, even when they are ribbing on each other. It is also why she is willing to admit when she has no idea what’s going on.

“I still have no idea what’s going on,” Ingrid voices, feeling out of touch. She wracks her brain for any memory of younger generation lingo but comes up with nothing. Her students often tease her about it.

Annette finally drops her hands, her face is still red, but not as much. Neither Sylvain nor Dorothea are being helpful at the moment. “Shipping is when you root for a relationship to work out.”

It takes a bit for Ingrid to process this new information. At first, she thinks it’s a joke but when none of them say anything, she frowns again.

Sylvain seems to take this silence as confusion. “It means half the student body wants Felix to make out with Dorothea and the other half with Annette,” he explains in his teacher voice, pointing at them one at a time.

Annette bolts out of her seat then. “I’m leaving!” she declares suddenly.

“Sylvain!” Ingrid scolds, slapping him on the arm as Dorothea laughs her head off.

“Ow, hey, what?” He flinches away from her. “What did I do?”

“Go apologize to her!” Ingrid says pointing but Annette is already out the door.

“Give her a moment,” Dorothea says. “She’s embarrassed. But you should apologize eventually Sylvain.”

Sylvain’s voice softens, “Yeah, you’re probably right.”

Ingrid chews her lip, concerned. It is likely that Annette isn’t that upset but she’s still worried. Sometimes Dorothea and Sylvain can push a little too far.

Dorothea sighs at Ingrid’s expression then presses both hands on the round table to get up. “I’ll go check on her,” she says to Ingrid, but then her expression turns playful again, “or maybe I’ll just tell her I don’t mind sharing.”

Her friend doesn’t stick around for Ingrid’s reaction, which is to simply choke on her food.

She likes having friends. It’s really nice, but sometimes they are a lot. Ingrid is still learning.

“She is so…” Ingrid groans into her hands, elbows propped up on the table, struggling for the right word to describe Dorothea.

“Mischievous?” Sylvain offers.

“That works.” She sighs. “I’ve never really had anyone like her in my life.”

“I don’t really think there’s anyone else like her.” Sylvain chuckles. “I’m not sure the world can handle it.”

Something about Sylvain’s words prickle underneath Ingrid’s skin but she’s really not sure what that means or what it is. He’s not wrong. Dorothea is one of a kind, Ingrid’s pretty sure, stunningly beautiful, playful, but also genuinely kind. “Yeah, she’s pretty great,” she says.

Sylvain blinks at her then, his expression a bit hard to read. In her two years of working here, she has gotten to know him quite well. Their classrooms are right next to each other after all and he is always coming over to borrow supplies. She used to hate him, since he seemed so lackadaisical about his teaching, seeming like he was improvising half of his lessons without a plan, but she’s come to understand that he is actually quite passionate, and the lazy handsome history and government teacher was partly an act.

But just partly.

“You know,” Sylvain says, nudging her foot with his, “I think you’re pretty great too.”

Ingrid furrows her brow at the flattery. It feels a little bit like an afterthought so she ignores it. Sylvain does not seem to mind. “Why do you know so much about the students’ shipping…” She pauses, trying to find the right word, “preferences?”

“Wars?” he offers.

“Do they really call them that?” Ingrid says, amused.

“Yep. Shipping wars -so says the internet.” He shrugs. “Our kids are not as sly as they think. You hear a lot of things in the hallway.”

“How come I haven’t heard anything?” she asks, not that she really thinks high school student gossip is worth very much. She never bothered when she was in school but it’s almost funny to know about it now. It makes her feel a little more connected to her students and it _is_ admittedly amusing.

“Because you’re terrifying Ms. Galatea.” 

“What?” She's affronted. “I am not! My students are _not_ scared of me!”

“That’s not what I mean,” he explains. “They’re terrified of disappointing you. A lot of them look up to you. They think you’re above the gossip.”

“Shouldn’t you be concerned that they think you’re not?”

“I’m like the young cool hip teacher you know?” He grins. “The friend. They relax a bit around me. It has its uses.”

She can’t deny that. She wishes, sometimes, that her students would open up to her more. Be a little more honest. She’s glad that Sylvain can be that for some of them.

She often wonders what else her students think about her. A part of her has always been afraid to ask.

“They seem to think,” Sylvain continues casually when Ingrid doesn’t reply, “that I keep dropping by your classroom to borrow stuff I don’t need as an excuse to see you more.”

Whatever Ingrid had been thinking before abruptly halts in her mind. She nearly drops her fork onto the table but years of varsity volleyball have honed her reflexes well and she catches it smoothly. If one wasn’t looking, one might not have noticed.

Unfortunately, Sylvain was looking.

“Uh-” she ends up saying.

Sylvain is a flirt. She knows this about him. It was another reason why she couldn’t stand him when she first met him but somehow, she has grown used to his flattery, it’s empty right? But something about this, the way he said it, almost too casually feels charged. Because there wasn’t a line about how beautiful she looks, wasn’t followed up so damn quickly by how great she is.

“Are you?” she challenges.

She has no idea what on earth makes her say that. Makes her stare him straight on and face him.

The smile he gives her can only be described as charming. “Of course,” he says. “I just can’t believe you never caught on.”

Ingrid does not shy away, even though her first instinct is to look away, even when her spine tingles with a sense of something new. She stares, steady on, evenly at him. Sylvain’s brown eyes, earnest and open, look right back.

“So now that I have,” she says as the hum around the room seems to dissipate, “what are you going to do about it?”

“Hmm.” Sylvain props his chin on his elbow, makes a show of thinking. “Ask you out on a date? Maybe?”

“Maybe?” she presses.

“What are you doing Saturday?”

Nothing, absolutely nothing. She has no plans whatsoever. “Hmm…” she trails, “I don’t know, I’d have to check my calendar.”

Sylvain waits. She watches him breathe in a small breath, and she realizes that he is not as calm as he looks, not with the way he tries not to hold it.

“I’m free,” she says.

“I thought you had to check your calendar,” he teases, amused. He lets out the little breath he failed at not holding. She can’t help but like the way that feels.

“I just did.” She grins.

She can tell that she’s charming him a little too. She didn’t know she could but now, she thinks she doesn’t want to stop. There’s something nice about this. She gets it now, the appeal of the thing, especially when it makes his expression shift to something softer.

The timing is bad. The lunchtime warning bell rings. She’s not sure where the time has gone. It feels like she had only just sat down.

The moment is broken, Sylvain’s expression fixes itself into his usual casual and cool demeanor. Ingrid fixes herself back into her teacher stance and they both rise from the table as the other still lingering teachers begin to file out of the room.

“Back to work.” He sighs. “Text you the details?” He sounds very hopeful and a little insecure, as if he expected her to cancel now that the moment has passed.

Ingrid nods with a smile. He waits as she packs the leftovers from lunch away and they walk back towards their classrooms together, something new between them.

She wonders if the students notice.

(They do)


End file.
